by Jane Brooke
Her super duper hard drive whirls through the sparking pain as she realizes that she is just one more Cox brother dead from her dreams.
With absolutely no remorse, she touches his smudged face, murmurs.
“Oh yes, Arvan. Oh yes.” Leaning forwards, she brushes a kiss past his lips, play it to the end, in her mind, “Oh yes.”
Big grin, ear to ear, Arvan goes to kiss her.
She turns her head, touches her bleeding eyebrow, banged up lips, whispers. “I’m hurting, Arvan. Plenty of time for lovin’ after, okay.”
Whimper, pout, little girl smile.
“Sure, Betty, ya just get yer sweet self, ready.” He stands, gazes down at his lovely, smiles, “An hour, okay?”
She nods, smiles, watches him walk out of the door. She turns, lowers her face towards the blood soaked sheets and allows a glob of blood to plop onto them.
Somehow, through the agony, she remembers Angel.
Feeling like she just had a telephone pole rammed in her ass, she straightens, sits on the edge of the bed, groans as her head sparks, spinning more than the usual spin.
From somewhere the words. “You’ve done it.” Spill out of her lips, “Angel.”
She stands, weaves, hitches up her hip huggers, presses her stomach, groans, weaves over to Angel, who is prone on the ground, her tiny ribs heaving, eyes open, seemingly stunned, but okay. She stares at Billy’s bloodied body, smiles, knows justice has been served; her own.
She lifts her pup as Angel wakes further, laps her face with kisses. Mandal groans, feels tears, whispers. “Thank you girr, you were very brave.”
Lap, lap, lap.
Giggles, she winces, groans, lay’s Angel on her pillow.
“Rest girl, we’re out of here.”
Pant, pant, pant, she settles in a ball, chills out.
Work, still to be done.
Righting her self, her head sparks as she sits on the edge of the bed, face pressed into her hands. After some moments she rise’s, stares into the wall mirror.
Her left eye, swollen partially shut, drips blood from her eyebrow. Her nose is bleeding, obviously broken, a welt on the bridge of if slightly bending it. Her cheek is reopened, more blood, knob on her forehead from Billys lighter love tap. Lips, cut, swollen, she groans, smiles within
The final transformation of the the New Better Mandal is almost complete.
“You’ve done it.” She whispers.
She stands and instantly falls to her knees.
She presses her face to the planks, trying to get blood into her brain
No passing out, just yet.
She hyperventilates and, then Jason’s words fill her head and she forces herself to her knees. She begins to crawl, moves to her valise, opens it, finds the Phillips Head and crawls over to the heating duct.
Fighting double vision, her head rolls on her neck. She forces her self to concentrate as she unscrews the four screws with shaking hands. The 700 K, wrapped in a plastic trash bag, goes into the valise.
She crawls back to the bed, leans her back against it and laces her face into her hands, moans.
Think through the pain, get organized, its close, another itzy-bitzy plan forms, unfortunately involving homicide filters through her kinetic brain.
Jason had told her people die in war, one more, why not? Hopefully that dead human being will not be her.
Something else, she is forgetting, what is it, mind burning in physical pain.
Oh yes, that’s it.
She lay’s on her stomach, smooches under the bed, than “CLICK.”
It’s done. Leave the fine details for her exit.
She stands, reels, Angel YELPS once, her nose pointed at the door.
Mandal, furrowed brow, moves to the door, peeks out, mostly wanting to make sure her Cadillac is right, and not suddenly flaming in fire from something the bone head might have done to her. Also, she wants to make sure the coast is clear.
Suddenly, she thinks, Arvans murder, though perhaps tragic, is the only way she and Jason are going to escape.
No one before her or after her will ever connect the dots.
Stumbling to the door, she cracks it, peeks out over at the garages. Arvan is there, back to the Caddy, very animated, seeming to be having a conversation with some one off camera right.
“PSSSST, PSSSST, PSSSST.”
Echos into her ears, as she watches as Arvan’s white T-shirt goes red, his chest exploding with bullet holes and he is violently thrown back, body jerking, out of her sight into the garage.
Leering, she gasps, as she watches as Bobby Ugo moves into the picture, now standing at the garage, looking this way and that way.
Her body shudders, becomes a solid ice mass, for now three other men, wearing black leather jackets, smoking, hand guns in their hands, are standing next to Bobby Ugo.
“OH.OH.” She gasps as Dim Dim, thee Dim Dim hulks into the picture, munching away on a burrito.
Then to her complete astonishment, she sucks in a gulp of terrified air, as she sees Anthony Uruguay, looking fatter than ever, dapper in a thousand dollar shark skin suit, all three hundred pounds of him, wobble’s into the picture.
“Bing, bang, whirl, zing and ping.”
Her mind computer overloads, almost crashes, so many scenarios ripping through it, a Chinese mathematician with an Abacus would be hard pressed to follow it.
Closing the door, she begins to move.
Friends From Home
SHE flops on the bed, hyperventilating, hands in her face as she think about old friends visiting from out of town.
Tony loves her, adores her, he wouldn’t be here if he didn’t, that’s good.
Other wise, snip, snip, snip, there goes the finger nails, a blow torch in the mouth, dead Mandal, but:
How to play Tony, how?
How does his love come into play?
Lightly armed, 38 in the boot, eight inch hunting knife there too; what decisions to make?
Only one left, “BLUFF.”
Perhaps true psycho love will prevail in the end.
Stands, weaves, grip on the valise, grabs Angel, moves to the back window, struggles it open, climbs out, moves to a dumpster, open its iron lids, stuffs the bag inside of it, then Angel too, pets her whispers,
“Shoo, Girl”.
She finds a card board box and wedge’s it between dumpster and lid, think’s that is good. If she dies Angel can climb out.
She closes the heavy iron lid back onto it.
Back through the window, on her stomach, under the bed, okay, still okay, good.
She crawls to the front door, does her thing, gives it a little tug, okay, groans, that’s the best she can do, she stands.
Deep breath, one of Jason’s Samurai’s now, courting death, no options left, play the last stand card.
She gulps her last bit of courage, moves to the window, glances back at the nail stuck into the bottom of the door, climbs out of the window.
No real day light yet, but threatening, she takes a deep breath as she scurries to the back of the bar. Body presses against the wall as she peeks around, sees two black leather thugs loitering around. She gulps her fear; she then slips through the door and into the bar.
In the shadows, she lingers, looks into the kitchen, gasps.
Mava, Art, riddled with bullet holes, deposited in pools of blood, are dead. Next to Art, is one of Tony’s men, a meat cleaver sticking out of his head; very dead.
“Fuck.” She moans, feeling a moment of remorse.
Her mind looses blood, she almost feints, leans against the wall, forcing her to stay up right.
Somehow, her brain stays alive as she glances behind the bar, sees Sue’s shotgun bracketed under the bar top. Her only plan, her
last plan, does not involve weaponry.
Yet, no bodies fool, except her self, she makes a mental inventory of the shotgun, 38, knife, complex ideas rack her aching head, her suicide plan. She knows if bullets simply will be not enough, that Tony’s feverish lust for her, that MUST be enough and more important than all the shot guns in the world, she gets it
Taking a step forward, she does not feel the massive shadow that is now falling over her body.
From behind her, a pair of hands, more powerful than any mans on Earth, wrap around her waist, engulfing it easily.
She YELPS, struggles, is lifted off her feet, boots banging someones legs. It is impossible to move free, as she glimpses Dim Dim’s numb face, eyes devoid of blood, feeling nothing, over her shoulder. She deflates, becomes limp as the giant walks across the bar and, then out the door.
Over near Arvans garage, the party has just begun, some huge men mingling. Just off the bar there are tables, chairs, a cozy setup. Anthony Uruguay, looking like a Cape-Buffalo wearing an Italian suit sits, smoking one of his Cuban Cigars.
Standing on the porch, leaning against the outside wooden wall, is, GULP, Bobby Ugo. He looks smartly dressed, though the look in his hell driven eyes makes Mandals mind go all dizzy.
He does not look happy seeing her, though as he smiles. She could be wrong about that, for all of the obvious wrong reasons. She glances, sighs, as the three remaining thugs walk over, are quiet as they smoke, loiter, wait for orders of what to do next.
Moving in front of Tony, he sucks at a sody pop through a straw. Dim Dim drops her to her knees, at his thousand dollar pair of Crock loafers.
Kneeling, her head is bowed for what in the world can she say, or do, for the frying pan is blistering flames and she is in it.
Gee Tony, I love you, miss you, was just going to come home. Filters through her brain.
Dim Dim, steps to the side, moves to the outdoor porch, stalls out, leans against a wall wondering what time lunch is.
Casual, Tony lowers his thick hand, layers his meat fingers upon her blond hair, which is stained with blood. Slowly, he is a man in love after all he places his fingers under her chin and, then lifts. Her face is trembling, so frail, just a little girl that made one little mistake.
He gazes at her through slits for eye sockets, places his cigar between his bulbous lips, inhales and, then exhales, careful not to blow smoke in her face.
She gulps, sighs, see’s conflicting emotions in his face, many she can not compute.
He hasn’t out right tortured and murdered her yet, that’s good.
Looking at the red ember of his cigar, she is waiting for him to plunge it into her eye. Instead, he asks.
“What have ya done to your self?”
Her lips quiver, a little smirk falls on her lips.
She shrugs her shoulders, her brow crinkles, she looks silly, says nothing and look’s like she just got her hand caught in the cookie jar.
She looks so precious, so hurt, bad girls often get boo boos, scrapes on their knees, their throats cut when they are bad.
Tony’s wants to weep for his mischievous little prankster girl looks so sad.
“I have missed you. A man misses his wife, when she is suddenly gone. Did ya plan on comin’ back ta me...Did ya, darling?”
Sniffles, nose running and mixing with drying blood; weeper tears falling down her cheeks.
She reminds herself that everyone dies; some people sooner than later.
Booby Ugo looks on, so furious by the whore’s new game. It is all he can do not to leap forward and cut her fucking tongue out of her head.
He does not.
Tony touches the collateral damage on her face, he says.
“I see you have spun yer web here. The Hillbilly wanted you. Tough little man, but foolish, yes Mandal”
She smirks, bad girl shrugs of her shoulders, sees a sigh of pity, hopefully for her in his face.
“You know, don’t you, Mandal? What Anthony Uruguay owns, he owns forever.”
She peeks at Bobby Ugo, the nine millimeter dangling at his side, his Dracula eyes welded on her and, then at Dim Dim, the three thugs, feels her 38 in boot, knife too as she realizes there are few options left.
Friends from Jersey are visiting. How to get out alive? Maybe grab a jet; Scoot into Dallas. Rent a car with one of Tony’s stolen Credit card. Nice touch, that. Zoom back to Jason, scoop him up, do it all over again. How fucked up can one girl be?
“To...Tony...I...I...I...I’m sorry, Tony honey. I...I just needed some time...you know...away...I...I was coming back, really baby.”
Great, this feels good, keep on going and just ignore the way Bobby Ugo is leering at you.
“You know, baby, it was...was...was kinda, kinda like a vacation, that’s all....Darling.”
She smiles, not asking herself why she would need Tony’s 700 large for a little flirt to Texas for a girl vacay.
Tony plugs his mouth with his cigar, inhales deeply and watches the red glow.
She leers as Tony lays it near her cheek.
Anthony Uruguay like Dim Dim is an artist of persuasion with many different implements. She knows that quite well.
Blues, eyes, tick, tick, tick, at the burning ember. Feeling the heat on her eyeballs, she knows the stogy is one of his favorite PROPS for his kind of persuasive kind of pillow talk.
“A vacation. That was all it was. Just a little time a way, Mandal? “
Tony crunches his jaw, purses his fat, wet lips, nods.
Mandal feels good, he seems to understand, what a great guy. Bobby Ugo, feeling bile in his mouth, almost throws up as his hand tenses on the grip of his nine nines.
“Yes...Yes Tony...I...I was coming back after...I...just a little vacay...I...I love you.”
“BINGO. A WINNER. Give the girl the matching set of dinner place mats and throw in the pink brocade napkin rings too.
Tony tilts his head, his mind spinning. After seemingly a life time of desperately wanting to hear those words, there, right there, gazing through loves eyes is his girl that he loves.
Is it possible? Are his girl’s eyes saying the very words he has wanted more than any kind of reason, perhaps so.
Though, having been bad, he’s going to have to ground her, a little, of course. Punish her a bit and maybe take her Yoyo away from her. Maybe cut her fucking horses heads off with a chain saw, right in front of her, nothin’ that bad, but ain’t she swell.
Bobby Ugo looks on in awe, finger exerting pressure on his trigger mechanism, 9 millimeter suddenly feeling very hot; his eyes bolted wide open.
Imaginary steam is boiling his brain alive, as through his mind, like a Wall Street Ticker, the words: ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME? JUST LET ME KILL THE WHORE cinder bye.
“Of course you was Mandal. You love yer Tony, don’t ya?” Lowering his hand, he takes one of hers, “ Come sit, on Daddy’s lap...Lets talk a little bit.”
“Okay honey, baby, only you Tony darling. I...I...I was coming back, please honey, really.”
She rise’s, reels, double vision again, fear, beat to shit, does that to a girl. Her body lithe settles onto his massive thighs, her face just inches from his fat lips as a pork roast wraps around her waist, the other on her lap.
She smells garlic, cigar smoke and she wants to puke.
Sucking on the cigar, her eyes revolve around the burning tip, waiting for it to be pressed into her skin.
“You’ve been a bad little girl Mandal, Do ya think ya should be punished for being such a bad girl?”
Wrecked, tears spilling down her face, nose running, mixing with blood dripping down her chin from fear, she replies, again morphing in to the hellion he loves.
“Sure, baby, I know I’ve been a bad girl. I need to be punished.” She giggles, ”Maybe a go
od spanking...I want to be a better wife...for you...Honey.”
God, she is so precious.
Tony thinks, stares at the red amber, Mandal too.
“Do you have something fer me? Somethin’ that don’t belong ta ya?”
“Sure, baby, sure...Every penny. I got it hidden, real good. Over there in my room, number #6.” She nods across the grounds to the motel rooms, “All of it. I took real good care of it. It’s yours baby.”
TIME FOR THE BLUFF.
“Let me get it for you...come on, I’ll show you...It’s in the heating duct.”
Raise, or fold now, its all in, everything on the green felt now.
Like an addict, never wanting to be far from his opiate, Tony looks at Bobby, jerks his head at the motel rooms and, then says. “Bobby, get the boys ta check it out.”
Bobby sniffs hard, his anger, lets his finger pressure relax, turns to his three soldiers, violently whips his head at the motel. “Number #6, go get it.”
The men nod, begin to walk off towards the Motel as Dim Dim stands like a Pyramid wondering when his next feed bag is.
Bobby checks on Dim Dim holding up the building, figuring the big fella is hungry. His mind burns, not yet, see what Tony does, yet, time to get on with it. He hates when Dim is hungry.
Tony, turning his attention back to his girl peruses her battle scars, sighs.
“Look what ya done, ta yerself.” He giggles, shakes his head back and forth, say’s, “What am I gonna do wit, ya?”
Smiling, sniff, sniff, sniff, sweet, a rascal, little girl tears, blushing, brushing her face against his hanging jowls, she whispers. “I don’t know, Tony. Take my TV privileges away.”
Tony laugh’s, hugs her tighter, almost cracking an already broken rib, just loving her to death.
Bobby, thoroughly sickened now, snorts the bile out of his throat, making choices now, pretty clear on them now.
As Mandal, Tony baby talk, Paulie, Jimmy’s son, Aunt Ruthie’s brother in Bay Shore, and Paulie Jr., Big Mikes son, and Mikie, Paulie Sr.’s boy out of Tom’s River move towards the the Motel and room #6.
Hand guns dangling at their sides and little discussion between them, besides reloading on more cigarettes, all three men move to the porch and stand in front of Tony’s whore’s motel room.
